Disney+: a TON of media takes

Since the announcement of Disney+ on April 11, a ton of articles have been written about the forthcoming video streaming service. The word Disney+ has appeared in 2183 pieces on Dow Jones/Factiva, a global news resource.

In a previous posting -- see  https://streamingvectors.blogspot.com/2019/05/apple-disney-synergy.html -- we used Word2Vec to study 854 articles that appeared on Factiva between April 11 and May 18 in which Disney+ appeared. (Word2vec processes raw text and positions words in a high dimensional vector space where semantically similar words are placed at nearby points.) At that time, some words/bigrams closest to Disney+ were:

('launch_november', 0.946),
('apple_tv+', 0.801),
('netflix', 0.774),
('india', 0.719),
('amazon_prime', 0.642),
(‘warnermedia’, 0.615
('mandalorian', 0.589)

Now we have more information to analyze as media stories regarding Disney+ proliferate. Between August 1 and 27 alone, 666 such articles were published, the highest run rate of any month to date.

Let’s compare more recent articles about Disney+ with our earlier findings. After analyzing 1329 articles appearing between June 1 and August 27, here is a new set of words/bigrams that nestle up to Disney+ (a score nearer 1 indicates a word is closer):

('november_12', 0.939),
('hulu_espn', 0.835),
('hbo_max', 0.814),
('australia', 0.795),
('apple_tvplus', 0.792),
('nbcuniversal', 0.776),
('bundle', 0.767),
('canada', 0.730),
('mandalorian', 0.668),
('national_geographic', 0.657),
('star_wars', 0.641),
('pixar', 0.640),
('falcon_winter', 0.639),
('lady_tramp', 0.622),
('netflix', 0.573),
('amazon_prime', 0.570),
('simpsons', 0.550),
('wandavision', 0.537),
('uk', 0.531),
('marvel', 0.523)

Some things have stayed the same:

• Anticipation of the November 12 launch date remains at the top of associations with Disney+.
• The relationship of Disney+ to AppleTV+ continues to be a focal point – see https://streamingvectors.blogspot.com/2019/05/apple-disney-synergy.html for our take on possible connections between these two streaming services.
• Although Disney's library (from Star Wars, Pixar, Simpsons,,,) will be unmatched, original programming on Disney+ is gaining interest. Witness the strong association of Mandalorian, The Falcon and the Winter Soldier, Lady and the Tramp remake, and Wanda Vision.

Some things have changed in the Disney+ Word2vec space:

• Although Netflix and Amazon Prime are still in the space, they have become less proximate to Disney+. More attention is now on the relationship of Disney+ to other forthcoming streaming media services, including HBO Max and NBCUniversal’s offering. Netflix is becoming so yesterday!
• Prominence is being given to National Geographic programming as a major brand builder for the Disney+ family-friendly offering.
• The Hulu/ESPN+/Disney+ bundle at $12.99/month is commanding attention as a major stake in the ground for pricing in the video streaming market. All other players are considering this benchmark.
• Disney+'s international rollout is of heightened interest. The service will be launching in Canada and The Netherlands along with the US on November 12. Australia will soon follow on November 19. Disney has not yet announced when the service will be launched in the UK, although this date is of intense interest.

Video streaming is the most important initiative for Disney in decades. Ever-changing word embeddings provide a unique substrate in understanding what's happening over time in this fascinating space. Keep your lap bar pulled down.